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Defence experts have suggested that churches may consider having guards or patrols (Picture: REUTERS)

Police have warned Britain’s Christian places of worship to review their security arrangements following the killing of a priest during an attack on a church in Normandy.

Neil Basu, the Deputy Assistant Commissioner and national operational police lead for protect and prepare, said that there was no ‘specific’ intelligence relating to attacks against British Christians, but that Isis and other terrorist groups had attacked Christians, Jews and other faith groups in the past.

Mr Basu said that he had instructed Christian places of worship to review their security arrangements and had circulated specific advice.

A Church of England spokesman said that security measures are ‘good sense in uncertain times.’

‘Church buildings are public buildings that are open to all,’ he said.

Jacques Hamel was murdered (Picture: REUTERS)

‘All public ministry involves being vulnerable to others, so security measures are good sense in uncertain times.’

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Colonel Richard Kemp, the former chairman of the Government’s Cobra Intelligence Group, told the Daily Telegraph that churches may consider having guards or patrols during services like some synagogues.

Yesterday, two attackers, who claimed allegiance to Isis, shouted ‘Allahu Akbar’ (‘God is greatest’) as they slit the throat of 85-year-old Jacques Hamel at a church in Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray.

One of the men had three knives a fake explosives vest. The other carried a kitchen timer wrapped in aluminium foil and had fake explosives in his backpack.